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- Rehnberg, Johan, 1986-, et al.
(författare)
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The Association between Education and Cognitive Performance Varies at Different Levels of Cognitive Performance : A Quantile Regression Approach
- 2024
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Ingår i: Gerontology. - 0304-324X .- 1423-0003. ; 70:3, s. 318-326
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Introduction: Educational differences in cognitive performance among older adults are well documented. Studies that explore this association typically estimate a single average effect of education on cognitive performance. We argue that the processes that contribute to the association between education and cognitive performance are unlikely to have equal effects at all levels of cognitive performance. In this study, we employ an analytical approach that enables us to go beyond averages to examine the association between education and five measures of global and domain-specific cognitive performance across the outcome distributions. Methods: This cross-sectional study included 1,780 older adults aged 58–68 years from the Longitudinal Aging Study Amsterdam. Conditional quantile regression was used to examine variation across the outcome distribution. Cognitive outcomes included Mini-Mental State Examination (MMSE) score, crystallized intelligence, information processing speed, episodic memory, and a composite score of global cognitive performance. Results: The results showed that the associations between education and different cognitive measures varied across the outcome distributions. Specifically, we found that education had a stronger association with crystallized intelligence, MMSE, and a composite cognitive performance measure in the lower tail of performance distributions. The associations between education and information processing speed and episodic memory were uniform across the outcome distributions. Conclusion: Larger associations between education and some domains of cognitive performance in the lower tail of the performance distributions imply that inequalities are primarily generated among individuals with lower performance rather than among average and high performers. Additionally, the varying associations across some of the outcome distributions indicate that estimating a single average effect through standard regression methods may overlook variations in cognitive performance between educational groups. Future studies should consider heterogeneity across the outcome distribution.
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| 2. |
- Strand, Bjorn Heine, et al.
(författare)
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Spousal bereavement and its effects on later life physical and cognitive capability : the Tromsø study
- 2024
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Ingår i: Geroscience. - 2509-2715.
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Spousal bereavement is associated with health declines and increased mortality risk, but its specific impact on physical and cognitive capabilities is less studied. A historical cohort study design was applied including married Tromso study participants (N=5739) aged 50-70 years with baseline self-reported overall health and health-related factors and measured capability (grip strength, finger tapping, digit symbol coding, and short-term recall) at follow-up. Participants had data from Tromso4 (1994-1995) and Tromso5 (2001), or Tromso6 (2007-2008) and Tromso7 (2015-2016). Propensity score matching, adjusted for baseline confounders (and baseline capability in a subset), was used to investigate whether spousal bereavement was associated with poorer subsequent capability. Spousal bereavement occurred for 6.2% on average 3.7 years (SD 2.0) before the capability assessment. There were no significant bereavement effects on subsequent grip strength, immediate recall, or finger-tapping speed. Without adjustment for baseline digit symbol coding test performance, there was a negative significant effect on the digit symbol coding test (ATT -1.33; 95% confidence interval -2.57, -0.10), but when baseline digit symbol coding test performance was taken into account in a smaller subsample, using the same set of matching confounders, there was no longer any association (in the subsample ATT changed from -1.29 (95% CI -3.38, 0.80) to -0.04 (95% CI -1.83, 1.75). The results in our study suggest that spousal bereavement does not have long-term effects on the intrinsic capacity components physical or cognition capability to a notable degree.
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